Sergey Sherman

Sergey Sherman is a Managing Director with Industrial Development Funding LLC, where he is part of an investment team focused on private credit and bespoke financing for energy, digital infrastructure, transportation, and industrial sectors. IDF describes itself as an SEC-registered investment adviser that manages capital for Qualified Institutional Buyers and provides capital solutions to large industrial companies selling existing products or bringing new products to market.

Before joining IDF, Sherman was Managing Director/Partner, Private Equity and Co-Head of Private Credit Strategies at Tuatara Capital LP. Tuatara was founded in 2014 as an alternative investment manager focused on the legal cannabis industry and later described itself as making long-term investments into market-leading, growth-stage companies. Sherman joined Tuatara in 2019 as Managing Director on the investment team, overseeing origination, structuring, due diligence, financing, and portfolio management.

Earlier in his career, Sherman was a Managing Director at Societe Generale, where he led U.S. coverage of middle-market private equity firms. He previously worked in the Financial Sponsors Groups at RBC Capital Markets and J.P. Morgan, and before investment banking he worked in business development and M&A at GE Capital. His IDF biography states that he has over 20 years of investment banking and finance experience and played leadership roles in more than $50 billion of M&A, debt, and equity capital markets transactions.

Sherman began his career as a nuclear submarine officer in the U.S. Navy. He holds a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Carnegie Mellon University and an MBA from The George Washington University. He has also served as a board member or observer for SpringBig, Hana, Hound Labs, Willow Biosciences, Caliva, CT Pharmaceutical Solutions, and Enlighten Technologies.

• IDF’s current focus is not seed-stage angel investing. The firm targets private credit and project-finance structures for companies and projects in energy, digital infrastructure, transportation, and industrial sectors.
• IDF states that its proprietary funding solutions help large industrial companies “sell existing products or introduce new products to the marketplace.”
• IDF’s public materials emphasize “bespoke capital solutions” across digital infrastructure, power, transportation, and industrial sectors.
• Sherman’s background suggests a bias toward structured transactions: origination, transaction structuring, diligence, financing, leveraged finance, private equity, and credit.
• At Tuatara, Sherman said he was joining to focus on “making investments in the high-growth legal cannabis industry” and to help “entrepreneurial and innovative cannabis companies” with banking and transaction experience.
• Tuatara’s stated investment philosophy centered on partnership with management teams, providing strategic, financial, and operational support to navigate regulatory and commercial frameworks.